A Missouri man who left a veiled death threat in an Arizona election official’s voicemail is looking at federal prison time, and he should be.
Walter Lee Hoornstra, 50, of Tecumseh, Missouri, was indicted by a federal grand jury for making an interstate threat and communicating it by an interstate phone call (read story here).
The victim, Stephen Richer, is the elected Maricopa County, Arizona, recorder. His office runs elections in Arizona’s largest county, where Phoenix is situated, which became a target of rightwing hate after Biden won Arizona with Maricopa County votes.
Richer, a Republican, took office after the 2020 election, but defended Maricopa County’s election office during Arizona Republicans’ sham “audit” of his county’s election returns (which, despite its partisan nature and many flaws, gave Biden more votes than the official count).
Hoornstra didn’t like that, and left this message on Richer’s personal cellphone:
“So, I see you’re for fair and competent elections, that’s what it says here on your homepage for your recorder position …. But you call things unhinged and insane lies when there’s a forensic audit going on. You need to check yourself. You need to do your f—ing job right because other people from other states are watching your ass. You f—ing renege on this deal or give them any more troubles, your ass will never make it to your next little board meeting.”
He was nabbed by the Department of Justice’s election threats task force, set up in 2021 to track down and prosecute threats against election officials. If convicted on both charges, he could get 5 years for the threat and 2 years for using the phone to communicate it; but criminal defendants usually enter plea deals that involve dropping some charges and downgrading others, and get much less than the maximum penalty for the crimes they plead to.
Still, it will be surprising if Hoornstra doesn’t get some jail time.
Of ~1,000 incidents reported to the task force so far, roughly 11% have led to criminal investigations, and several people have been charged with crimes (see story here), including James W. Clark, 38, of Falmouth, Massachusetts, for allegedly making a bomb threat against Arizona’s secretary of state (see story here). My guess is he’ll do more time than Hoornstra, if both are convicted, given the more direct and violent threat.
A very high percentage of Republicans across the country refuse to believe that Biden legitimately defeated Trump. This was despite the Electoral College giving Republican presidential candidates a built-in advantage that has allowed several (including Trump in 2016) to win despite losing the popular vote. Now, the Republican Party as a whole is rejecting democracy, and rightwing extremists are increasingly turning to threats and violence.
A frequently used tactic is doxing, i.e., publishing home addresses and phones of people they don’t like to expose them to threats and harassment. The left occasionally does this, too, for example by picketing Supreme Court justices’ homes, but not as frequently or viciously; and threats of violence against public officials and employees are coming almost exclusively from the far right.
With Republicans talking about “civil war,” threatening public officials, and trying to overthrow elections, there’s plenty of reason to fear America is sliding downhill into fascism and totalitarianism. When a mountain climber slips on an icy slope, he arrests his fall by jamming his ice pick into the slope. That’s why the task force is a vital tool for preserving our democracy, and why it’s crucially important to identify, prosecute, and jail the people making threats.
Election violence needs to be nipped in the bud, or it become unstoppable. Under Biden, federal law enforcers are doing that, which wouldn’t happen under a Republican administration. Judges need to do their part by cracking down on these crimes, and giving the perpetrators serious jail time. In short, the law enforcement and legal systems ought to make examples of them, in order to deter others of like mind, prevent them from becoming a mob, and stop the threats from becoming a torrent or turning into actual violence.
This is what’s necessary to arrest our nation’s slide toward oblivion, before the slip becomes a fatal fall for all of us. Sending these people to prison will save our country and freedom.